Competitive pressures in industry, particularly the automotive industry, dictate a necessity to make light sources as small and economical as possible. This saves material costs, and can improve optical imaging. In competition with these needs, large fields areas may need to be illuminated, and with vehicle illumination, a substantial visual image is need on the surface of the vehicle to mark the presence of the vehicle. These goals have been met in the past by the use of relatively large incandescent lamp and reflector systems. The advent of solid-state lighting, such as light emitting diodes, has pointed in the direction of improving these systems by drastically reducing the size of the light source while increasing their longevity; however, there is still a need to spread beam-forming illumination over a broad area to better illuminate the vehicle. It would be an advance in the art if such a system could be provided without the necessity of using a reflector. It would be a further advance in the art to provide a lighting system that can utilize replacement light sources. It would be a still further advance in the art to provide a combination solid-state light source with a direct view optic that can be customer designed in a variety of displays.